Power Management Weirdness

[B. Kenny]

I have been experiencing some weird power management "events" with Win 98 SE. I originally had the monitor set to turn off after 1 hour, but set the hard drive to never turn off; likewise not having the system go into standby. With these settings I noticed the system would freeze and I would have to reset the computer. I was advised to never use the monitor setting, but to turn off the hard drive. I did this and still had periodic occurrences of the system locking up. Also, it seemed the hard drive didn't always turn off. I then opted for just using the screensaver and haven't had any lock ups, but I am concerned about leaving the system powered on all day and night as I never turn it off to save the system from the power surge generated with a cold boot.
Any suggestions, denizens of the PC Forum? Also, I noticed when the monitor and hard drive turned, when they "woke up", the image on the monitor had drifted to the left and down, requiring about 10 minutes to stay put.
Cheers,
B. Kenny

[B. Kenny]

Also, a couple of days ago, I turned off and unplugged my machine due to a chance of an electrical storm, and when I booted up, RealPlayer had added itself to the startup menu and added its icon to the system tray. I posted a query to this forum a couple weeks ago about memory being used when nothing was running and was directed to the apps loaded at start up. I removed several programs, including RealPlayer, and the system resources usage improved by about 30%(30% was freed). Anybody know how or why a program would load itself at start up?

[jinn]

Not sure about how Real Player can add itself to the start menu, unless you upgraded or something. The leave on/off debate is about 50/50. Noone really knows what's better. Some turn it off, some leave it on. I turn mine off only at night except on weekends. A friend of mine says he's left his running for over 3 years straight give the once in a while restart for memory leaks. When you shut down your computer it isn't necessarily a cold boot. I know others have a different opinion on that, but, it is more like in standby than off. It's all about personal preference.

[mjc]

If you had RealPlayer set up for automatic updates when he auto-update is complete and the installation is finished, the next reboot will complete the process and the default settings may be used (which is autostart). The same goes for just about any program that has an auto-update feature. Besides not having complete contol over the up dated process the auto-updates are "bandwidth hogs" and can tie up your internet connection.

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mjc
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[B. Kenny]

I disabled the RealPlayer Update option as well as uninstalling RealDownloads. As for the power management issues, my instructor at school said that Win 98Se can act strange sometimes. I was wondering if anybody else had encountered these problems.
Cheers,
B.Kenny

[Paleo Pete]

Power management settings in BIOS can also cause problems sometimes. I keep mine disabled in BIOS and run it by the settings in display Settings\Screen Savers. Never have had any problems.

due to the display changing places I'd think you may have a video driver issue as well, try updating the video drivers and see if that helps. If possible, remove the video card from Safe Mode first, reboot and let Windows find it, point it to the ne drivers if you can, if it doesn't give you that option go into Device Manager and change drivers to the new one.

The refresh rat emay also be afecting it. Look up the documantation on your monitor and find out what the recommended detting is, make sure it's set to that refresh rate.

I leave my machine on 24/7 and have had no problems. As stated above it's basically a matter of choice, some say do, some say don't, but so far I've left most of the machines I have here running for months at a time and none have had any problems. One is a Packard Bell Pentium 60 running win3.11, must be 10-12 years old and works perfect. I've left it running with the monitor turned off, (no power management) instead of a screensaver for 3 months, only rebooting 2-3 times during that period. Most stable machine I have...This one is never turned off, and once I got rid of the lockups due to a video driver issue it never gives me any problems at all. Been running it that way for 4 years. I only turn it off to work on it, reboot every 3 or 4 days to clear memory, only shut down completely if I have to "pop the hood" or thunderstorms look bad...

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[B. Kenny]

Thanks for the input. I shall go to bed now and try updating the video drivers tomorrow. I recently purchased the monitor, an NEC Multisync FE700, and except for the slight migration problem(it stays put if Power Mangement is disabled via display properties), it has been wonderful living in 17" flat screen land, especially when you've been languishing in 15" roundy screen with no rotate/pincushion/aligntopandbottom land.

Cheers,
B.Kenny

[tjaymadison]

Everyone, except laptop users, would do themselves a huge favor and have many fewer problems by:

Turning off / disabling all power management / APM / ACPI settings in BIOS and in Windows.

If your system will be idle for more than an hour, turn the monitor off with its own power switch.

The PC Guide -- Power Management: Pros and Cons (http://www.pcguide.com/care/care/gen/powerPM-c.html)


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[BigBlue66]

Hey,

For the last fifteen years or so, I have turned my computer off every night. During the day, if I plan to be away from the computer for more than an hour or so, I turn the monitor off by its own power button, as mentioned above. Otherwise, I either use a screen saver or manually throw the system into standby.

All those power management options are just not worth it, IMHO, since they often cause more problems than they alleviate.

I have never had a problem with any computer I have ever had by turning it completely off every night. As for the PM options, I disable them in BIOS and Windows both.

Cheers,

Big Blue 66


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Woe is me.

[sea69]

lotts of good points here on this topic. http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/smile.gif

Personally, I leave my machine on (all the time) except when maintenance is ongoing and I need to reboot, or I add remove any software or change configurations that require reboot.

I bought this pc July 30th 2000, (dreaded Compaq..lol- 7AP140 desktop Athlon 800Mhz, 128sdram, Win98se) and it has been online 24/7 since without a problem. hehe almost "B-Day" one year for it!! http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/wink.gif

wanna see it?? click me (http://shopping.yahoo.com/shop?d=m&id=1990376931&cf=1&clink=)

POWER MANAGEMENT settings are for laptops. They are superflourous for desktop pc's. Even on laptops there are still many problems with these settings. They are meant to save battery life.

I have NO screensaver running, (takes up resources unneccesarily) and can stall defragg, I have everything set to "NEVER", always on, and when I go to sleep, so does my monitor. ( by pressing the OFF switch)

TaskMonitor, is another "idiot' setting that is not needed except by perhaps those that are running large amounts of computers that they don't have time to manage individually.(scheduled maintenance- scandisk and defragg)=weekly.

Storms are another reason to turn your machine off of course, but I follow the logic that spinning the disk up and down CAN NOT be good for your 'Life Expectancy' of the hard drive, as moving parts will eventually wear out.= the more you restart the more wear on your disk......

There are other factors for each individual machine (and the habits of the person using it) that play into these decisions as well.

http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/wink.gif

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[This message has been edited by sea69 (edited 06-19-2001).]

[B. Kenny]

Thank you all for the input. I've disabled the power management settings in the Display Settings but couldn't find the power management in the BIOS. I've got a Dell 4100 series PIII 933 with an Intel-Ami Bios, and it's not listed. I know it's ACPI but I think the fine folks at Dell have it hidden so home users can't fiddle with it. I just got this machine 2 months ago and am a bit tentative about taking the door off, let alone tinkering with the BIOS. I'll just have to give the Dell Support techs a call and see if I can pry some info from them.
Again, thanks for the help.

B.Kenny